


young lovers, and they are not sleeping

by cooliopio



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/M, Ishbal | Ishval, Mustang's Team, Storytelling, Team Bonding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-01
Updated: 2021-01-01
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:14:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,713
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28472208
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cooliopio/pseuds/cooliopio
Summary: The restoration of Ishval had been ongoing for nearly eighteen months, now, with hardly any rest. After Mustang and his men successfully instituted an order they stubbornly advocated for, the team really needed a break, and so, to Ishval they wentSo that is how they—Captain Hawkeye, Brigadier General Mustang, First Lieutenant Breda, Second Lieutenant Fuery, and the newly re-enlisted First Lieutenant Havoc—ended up shooting the shit around a fire on an already warm night.-Team Mustang tells stories around a campfire, and they learn more about Riza and Roy's childhood together, as well as some of their more intimate endeavors, much to Riza's chagrin.
Relationships: Riza Hawkeye/Roy Mustang
Comments: 11
Kudos: 48





	young lovers, and they are not sleeping

**Author's Note:**

> T for language!

Laughter bounced off the pale stone walls surrounding the group that was sitting around a tame bonfire located at the center of a rather small courtyard nestled in between some modest, two-level family homes. As the sun sank further into the horizon, so did the comrades, taking advantage of the clear night, sinking further into their chairs.

The restoration of Ishval had been ongoing for nearly eighteen months, now, with hardly any rest. The remaining members of Mustang’s team—all but Falman—were on a short respite from the drole of paperwork back in central to visit the site they were working so hard to aid. They all wished they could stay in Ishval for longer periods of time, but the administrative and clerical work that came with countless law and policy changes, which they had to fight tooth and nail for, required their near constant presence in Central. After they successfully instituted an order they stubbornly advocated for, but the rest of Central lawmakers seemed to be against—the reversal of the annexation of Ishval—the team _really_ needed a break, and so, to Ishval they went.

They were welcomed with open arms by Elder Shan and the Ishvalans involved with the complicated political battleground that was this restoration—including Scar. But the team remained an armlength away from Miles and the other Amestrian military assigned to the project; they were on a break, after all, and they didn’t want to get in over their heads with paperwork and policy talk and negotiations. And the Ishvalans, who were exceptionally pleased with the return of autonomy, were just fine with that.

The team spent the day touring the rebuilding efforts, talking with locals in passing about what the citizens wanted negotiated upon their return to Central, and generally soaking in the sight of a once again happy and lively Ishval; one with children chasing each other, markets popped up on corners and in small town squares, and smiles littering the landscape. After the day’s events, the team retreated to their lodgings.

So that is how they—Captain Hawkeye, Brigadier General Mustang, First Lieutenant Breda, Second Lieutenant Fuery, and the newly re-enlisted First Lieutenant Havoc—ended up shooting the shit around a fire on an already warm night. But there, right then, they were just Riza, Roy, Heymans, Kain, and Havoc: friends, sharing the night.

Their peals of laughter came from the stories that they were swapping; ones from their childhoods, awkward nights in the academy, missteps at the bar, or almost forgotten shared experiences. For being friends and coworkers for so long, there were a _lot_ of stories the rest hadn’t heard. They supposed that just came with the terms and conditions of stopping the apocalypse and conducting a coup.

“That did _not_ happen!” Havoc shrieked at Breda, cigarette dangling from his lips and face quickly growing redder.

Breda laughed, “it totally did! Your jacket had bullet holes in it!”

“no, no! you walked in at the end of things! What you saw was way out of context!”

“Sure, Hav,” Breda antagonized, “keep telling yourself that.”

Havoc grumbled and slumped back into his chair as the rest laughed around him.

“Oh, that reminds me of something that happened when I was a kid,” Riza choked out between laughs.

Mustang gasped, “Riza, you _wouldn’t_!”

Riza laughed menacingly, “I would!” She looked up conspiratorially, “men,” she started rather seriously, “our dear general, none other than Roy Mustang, is absolutely terrible with any gun other than the military issued .45.”

The men leaned in, curious. Roy groaned.

“Well, he can shoot fire, so him being awful with a gun isn’t out of my expectations,” Havoc amused.

Riza nodded, “Right. But it is worse than you can imagine. I promise you.”

Roy muttered something under his breath.

“When I was, oh, I don’t know, twelve, maybe? Roy was newly fifteen, and he was _adamant_ about accompanying me while I went hunting behind our house.”

“In my defense,” Mustang interjected, “there were rumors about that creep who lived at the end of the lane in town was creeping around again.”

Riza gave a good-natured scoff, “and I wouldn’t have been able to handle it myself? You would’ve been no help, seeing as how things went.”

Mustang riled up at this, but before he could retort, Breda complained to get on with the story, already.

Riza cleared her throat, “Alright, so, I usually went hunting in the mornings. We were the only house around for miles, so we weren’t too concerned about the gunshots. I hunted with a rifle and would shoot birds out of the sky to have my dog go retrieve them.”

A quiet “good boy” was heard from Kain’s direction.

“I wasn’t thrilled about having _Mr. Mustang_ , an incompetent city boy, help me, but it was early and I was tired so, in the end, I shoved a rifle in his hand to get him to shut up and walked out the door and into the woods. Roy, at this point in time, had apparently not even touched a gun in his life, because the fool was walking with the barrel pointed at his foot, not to the side, and,” she paused for dramatic effect, “the safety off.”

There were faux-dramatic gasps from the crowd as Mustang shook his head from the memory.

“Not only that!” Riza continued, “with his finger on the trigger, too!”

Kain let out an exasperated groan, laughing, “even I’ve never done that, and I don’t even carry my issued gun on me regularly!”

Riza gestured at Kain and looked at Roy, communicating to him with her face: _“See?!”_

“So, I was doing what I usually did, and Roy wasn’t paying much attention to what I was up to. I lined up a shot and hit a _beauty_ of a pheasant, but the gunshot startled Roy so much that he jumped, thinking there was danger. And when he jumped, he nearly shot himself in the foot.”

“I did not ‘nearly shoot myself in the foot!’” Mustang mocked.

Riza smirked “tell that to the gunpowder on your boot from that day.”

“It was ash!” he defended.

“My ass! You didn’t have flame alchemy at that point yet, and I certainly did not have the notes yet, so it couldn’t have been!”  
Mustang slinked into his chair until his chin hit his chest, grumbling, but not objecting.

As the group’s laughter died out, Havoc cleared his throat. “I knew you guys knew each other for a while, but not that far back. What, Mustang, you move near Reez’ when you were younger? I didn’t know that.”

Mustang shook his head, “No, no. We lived together from the time I was, what, twelve?” he asked, looking at Riza for confirmation, and returning to speaking when she nodded her head in affirmation, “until the time I went to the academy. Her father was my alchemy teacher, and it’s typical for apprentices to live in with their masters because of the difficult coursework.”

The rest of the men looked like he hung the moon.

“That means,” Breda spoke up dubiously, “you have embarrassing stories about Riza as a child, no?”

Mustang shook his head, “Unfortunately not. She practically ran the house ever since I arrived, and she was only nine. Nothing she did wasn’t without purpose, so nothing embarrassing ever happened to her. At least, when I was around.”

Havoc and Breda quirked an eyebrow as Riza, questioning.

She sighed, “my mother died when I was young. I had to learn to take care of things. My father wasn’t a fan of the military so he never became a state alchemist, even though the money would have helped, and he couldn’t devote himself to anything else. So, we lived very frugally. I had things to worry about and chores to do. That was practically all I did.”

The men nodded in understanding.

“But you must have done _some_ things. Do you have _any_ stories from childhood that aren’t boring?”

Mustang let out a curt laugh, “yeah, I have one.”

The rest of the team’s heads swiveled to Mustang, eager to hear the story.

“The Hawkeye estate was two stories and an attic, and the exterior had some weird molding, and there were trees practically growing into the sides. This made it particularly easy to make it up to the roof. One night, when Riza was, oh I don’t know, about fourteen and I was sixteen, I was _rudely_ wakened by banging on my bedroom window—my _second-floor_ bedroom window. When I looked to see what the noise was, it was Riza looking in, gesturing me to open the window. When I opened it, she just walked in, didn’t say anything, and got in my bed, mumbled something about a nightmare, and went to sleep.”

“Oh, Riza, I didn’t know you were so _promiscuous_ , sleeping in a man’s bed,” Havoc jeered.

Riza elbowed him in the side in retort, “nothing like _that_ happened.”

Mustang smirked, “at that time, anyway.”

The team froze for a few seconds before breaking out in complete pandemonium.

“HOLY SHIT!” Havoc yelled, jumping out of his chair, “you two boned?!”

His comment was mixed in with Breda complaining that he lost the betting pool.

Riza crossed her legs over one another and pinched the bridge of her nose. “ _Sir,_ ” she reprimanded tautly, “ _that_ wasn’t like _that_ either. No, Havoc, Roy and I did not bone.”

Havoc looked a little disappointed at this new information, but Breda cheered up a tone and mumbled something about still being in the running.

“But then what _did_ happen?” Kain asked, rather uncharacteristically from his usually reserved self who stayed in his lane.

Mustang began speaking, but Riza cut him off, “I will tell you the story of what happened because I know _Roy-Boy_ is going to embellish it. What _happened_ was: the night before Roy left for the academy, a couple years after Roy’s story, I was pretty sad. My father was not a particularly _good_ father, and Roy was about my only support at the time, as well as my only friend, and he was a great buffer between me and my father. So, yes, I was not thrilled about him going away. Quite similarly to his story, I knocked on his window again—the floorboards were creaky, and my father would have been furious to see us out of our rooms after lights out—and I,” Riza sighed, “I just wanted to spend some more time with him before he left,” she finished softly, avoiding eye contact.

“You were totally crying,” Mustang teased.

“Maybe so!” Riza corroborated, “but I was emotional: sad, angry, already lonely, and showing any kind of emotion was particularly out of character for me in my former years.”

“In your former years? You mean you _now_ is you showing emotion? Shit, Roy, what was she, a stone wall?” Havoc mused.

“You have _no_ idea,” Mustang affirmed to Havoc.

Riza cleared her throat, “Well, anyway. It was night, I was emotional—and so was he, and tensions were running high. So…” she began, staring out into the sky for a moment before closing her eyes, sighing, and shaking her head, “we made out like teenagers.”

“To be fair,” Mustang added, “we _were_ teenagers.”

Breda let out an amused laugh, but Havoc was practically hysterical with this newfound information. “No way. No way! You and Mustang?! This is great. This is great! Do you have any idea how haywire the rumor mill would be back at Central if they knew this?! They already think you’re together. Oh man… oh man!”

Riza slapped at Havoc’s arm, “and this behavior is exactly why we _don’t_ tell anyone about our childhood together, and _especially_ not about our one-off make out session... reactions like this’ll get us court martialed”

“God,” Havoc went on, “next you’ll be telling us that Mustang’s seen you in the buff!”

Roy and Riza shared an apprehensive look with one another, both thinking about her back, which did not go unnoticed by Jean.

“Hold on— _have you?!_ ” he practically yelled.

“Well, kind of.” Mustang signed.

“Kind of?!”

“the circumstances were a bit… extenuating.”

“ _Extenuating?!”_

“It’s not really my place to elaborate…”

“Roy,” Riza interrupted softly, “don’t you think we can trust them with the truth after all these years?”

Roy leaned into Riza’s space and continued to converse lowly.

“Which truth?”

Riza scoffed, “The one that we’re both thinking about, Roy-Boy.”

“Your back?”

Riza hummed in affirmation.

“That’s… why now?”

Riza shrugged, “I don’t know. Now is about as good as ever. And I mean, I trust them with my life. It… kind of feels like I’ve been deceiving them all this time.”

“Riza, no,” Roy stressed, “you haven’t been _deceiving_ anyone.”

“I know practically all their deepest and darkest secrets and struggles; don’t you feel I kind of owe it to them?”

“You, Riza Hawkeye, don’t owe anyone _anything_ , especially not your back. But… if you want to… I won’t stop you.”

Riza hummed in acknowledgement, and Roy leaned out of her space and back into his chair.

Riza cleared her throat as she prepared to continue the conversation with the group, which was patiently waiting for the verdict on… whatever they were talking about from Roy and Riza.

“My father and Roy’s Teacher, Berthold, got very sick shortly before Roy left for the academy. He knew and I knew he was going to die at some point soon. My father, you see, was the man responsible for inventing flame alchemy. Of course, flame alchemy is dangerous, we all know that, and have seen the outcome of it.” the group nodded solemnly, “he needed to write down his life’s work, but he didn’t really trust traditional means of inscription, since they were too easily stolen or misplaced. My father did want to pass down the secret to flame alchemy to Roy at some point in his life, when he deemed Roy ready, but he wasn’t sure that he would live to see the day he could pass it on,” Riza bit at her nails as she contemplated her next words, “a few weeks before he died, after his condition noticeably worsened, he decided that he needed to write it down somewhere secure. He asked me if I would be willing to help guard his life’s work, and I agreed. At the time, I had no idea what I agreed to, but what I imagined was in no way what I expected.” Riza closed her eyes and let out a steady breath, growing visibly anxious. Roy placed his hand gently on her knee to soothe her. “My father transcribed the secrets of flame alchemy… on me. On my back. In the form of a very big, very painful tattoo,” she spit bitterly.

The men were watching her in abject horror.

“So, _I_ got to decide when Roy was ready to be trusted with flame alchemy, which wasn’t too long after my father’s death. And since it was on my back, I had to be topless while he studied it. I sat for hours as he studied, because it was my father’s wish that it would not be written anywhere.”

The team nodded their heads in dreadful understanding.

“So, is that why you wear turtlenecks? To hide it?” Kain asked softly.

Riza nodded, “That’s part of it. It doesn’t rise too far up my back, but, ah, some scars do.”

“Scars?” Breda asked, confused.

“After the war,” Mustang began hoarsely, “Riza asked me… she asked me to… to _burn_ the tattoo off of her back, so flame alchemy could not be used by anyone else, ever. After the horror and destruction caused by it, by _me_ , I couldn’t disagree.”

Havoc whistled lowly, “Bet that wasn’t a walk in the park”

Mustang scoffed, “hardest thing I as ever asked to do, and I was asked to commit genocide.”

“It was the right thing to d—” Riza began.

“But it doesn’t mean it was easy, Riza!” Mustang snapped, interjecting. He sighed, calming. “I had known you for a decade at that point. It was torture to me, to torture _you_ like that.”

“You did not _torture_ me,” Riza derided.

“That one is still up for debate,” Mustang mumbled.

“Can I see it?” Breda asked rather bluntly.

“You… want to see it?” Riza quizzically asked, “the tattoo?”

“Yeah,” Breda nodded, the epitome of nonchalant, “why not? I’m curious to what it looks like.”

Riza gave an inquisitive look to Roy, who only shrugged.

“I mean, if you really want to,” Riza acquiesced. “Do the rest of you want to see it?” She asked.

“I can’t say I’m not curious to what the secrets to flame alchemy look like” Havoc contemplated.

“Seconded,” Fuery added.

“Well, you won’t be able to learn anything. The important parts are scarred over,” Roy said, rather confused himself.

“I mean, I still want to see it. Riza’s had a tattoo this whole time? That’s kind of a shock,” Breda shrugged.

“You guys don’t seem very upset at it,” Riza noted bluntly.

“Oh, I’m absolutely furious at your old man,” Breda replied, still calm.

“Oh yeah,” Havoc nodded in tandem with Breda, “If he wasn’t already dead, I’d go take care of him myself.”

“I think mustang would’ve beaten you to it” Fuery commiserated, anger in his words evident.

Mustang laughed softly, “can’t say you’re wrong there.”

“Well, alright,” Riza said, standing up “don’t try and catch a peek, you perverts,” she chided.

Riza turned around, and Mustang handed her his button-up that he had discarded earlier to slip on backwards over her front to cover her. Riza thanked his thoughtfulness with a gentle smile. Her hands gripped the hem of her usual black turtleneck, hesitating for a moment, not out of fear, but out of habit. No one living but Mustang and Rebecca knew about it, and now that amount was going to more than double. With a resigned sigh, she lifted her shirt, revealing her back, lit by the bonfire in the night.

“Holy shit,” Breda admired, “that’s kind of sick as hell.”

“Kind of?” Havoc admonished, “It _is_ sick as hell.”  
Riza laughed, never in her life did she expect her burden to be viewed as something to be admired as a piece of art rather than a forbidden knowledge to be hidden from prying eyes forever.

“Well, thanks,” she said with laughter in her voice, “I’m glad someone thinks so.” Riza let her shirt fall back down her torso and returned the button-up back to Roy as she sat.

“…is that the _only_ time you’ve seen her in the buff? What about you, Riza? You ever seen Mustang in his birthday suit?” Havoc spoke up after a brief silence, calling back to what got them on this topic in the first place.

Riza moaned in fake exasperation, “well, kind of, yes, if you count going swimming in a pond when we were _literal_ children.”

Havoc hummed in consideration, rubbing his chin, “well, were you guys skinny dipping?”

“Hardly,” Mustang interjected, “Riza had a swimming costume, though she scarcely used it.”

Riza playfully smacked Roy, “that makes it sound worse than it is!” she looked at the other men to explain, “we never really planned to go swimming, it would just be a spur of the moment thing after doing our barn chores, so we’d be in our underwear more times than not.”

“sure, sure, Reez,” Havoc playfully leered, “whatever makes you sleep better at night.”

The crowd laughed, the serious tone of the moment dissipating.

“Hey,” Fuery began, “do you guys remember the time when Hayate—”

The team easily settled into their storytelling ways until the late hours of the night, often having to forcefully muffle their laughter as to not wake the residents.

-

Roy once again woke to a tap on his window. However, being on the ground floor of their lodgings made this a much less distressing event. Roy smiled widely to the assailant, opening the window and stepping aside.

“You know, you can. Just go through the front door. We don’t have to sneak around like we did when we were teenagers.”

Riza, who easily climbed into the room through the wide window, hummed. “sure, but that wouldn’t be as fun, now, would it?” she teased, wrapping her arms around Roy’s waist and pressing the length of her body against his after he closed the window.

Roy chuckled lowly, placing his head on top of Riza’s. “No, I suppose not,” he agreed.

“When will be able to tell them the _other_ truth, do you think?” Riza asked softly.

Roy thought about her question as he led them into bed, Riza snuggling into his side.

“When this is all over, probably,” He commiserated.

“I wish it could be sooner,” she whispered.

“I know.” Roy hugged Riza to him tighter, “but too much is at stake for it to get out.”

“But they’re our most trustworthy men,” Riza whined, “…I just want them to share our happiness with us. I hate having to play along and pretend that only the stuff that happened before we joined up is real.”

“Sure, they’re trustworthy. I’d take a bullet for them—” Riza glared up at him, “—that you would, in turn, take for me, I’m sure,” he chuckled in earnest, “but we can’t risk getting court martialed. Not now.”

Riza sighed. “I know. Not now.”

“Besides,” Roy added, “you heard how Havoc responded when he found out we made out over a decade ago. If he found out that not only had I have ‘seen you in the buff’” he mocked, “as many times as I have, but we’ve done _that—”_ “Boned,” Riza interjected, “ _Boned,”_ Roy corrected sarcastically, “I think all of Amestris would have heard him from here.”

Riza let out a hardy laugh. “Yeah, you’re probably right. Doesn’t mean I don’t want to tell them, though.” Her voice trailed off at the end of her sentence.

“I know,” Roy kissed Riza’s head tenderly, “I know. I want to tell them too.”

“Soon,” Riza mumbled into his chest.

“Soon,” he affirmed, kissing Riza’s temple, this time, before they both fell into a peaceful sleep.

This small, pseudo vacation really was much needed.

**Author's Note:**

> for their ages, i like to think they're two years apart, but, like, they also have a period of time where they're three years apart because their birthdays line up weird. So Riza is twelve and roy is freshly fifteen, but riza is less than six months from thirteen. With ~childhood romance~ i dont like to make the gap too large otherwise it feels weird. the developmental difference between a 13 y/o and 16 y/o is too much for me to write. Riza is 26 and roy is 29 in the manga... so it works i guess*shrug* 
> 
> this is my last fic of 2020! im writing. this note at 11:38pm. wow! 
> 
> As always, talk to me on tumblr @ unfairlawwyer!!


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